Arcana Heart 3/Extend Force/old

Contents

Extend Force

Extend Force is the new system in Arcana that gives every character extra versatility and speeds up the pace of the game significantly. You can activate Extend Force by pressing A+B+C at any time while standing on the ground outside of guarding. When you use Extend your character will instantly return to neutral. This means that it can be used as a free cancel (i.e. BlazBlue's Rapid Cancel) to improve comboability or keep yourself safe after a risky move. During Extend Force your character will move 1.15 times faster. In this time you can perform combos that your normally would not be able to do or make overheads and mixups more deadly. Also during Extend Force, you gain extra abilities from your Arcana. Some Arcanas help you regenerate health, give you extra movement options, or even add clash frames to everything you do. Please check out the individual Arcana pages to see what the Extend Force attributes are for each Arcana. Extend Force will normally end when the Force Gauge reaches 0%, at which point it will start to recharge. The one exception to this is while comboing in EF; the EF state will not wear off until your opponent is able to tech. This means it is sometimes possible to prolong Extend Force with supers or long combos even after the gauge has reached 0%.

Using Extend

There are many uses for Extend Force. Learning how to use it effectively will make you a formidable opponent.

Offensive

Similar to Homing Cancels, you can use Extend Force to help with combos. Just like HCs you can cancel normals, specials, and even some supers into EF. This is called an Extend Force Cancel. Due to the fact that you return to neutral, EFCs are very good for combos since you can just jump right after it and using a NH (5D) without having to burn a bar off your Arcana Gauge. The faster movement makes it harder for the opponent to find an opportunity to tech out. Pressure and mixups become more dangerous as well. Overheads that would normally come out even on block are at advantage and there is less risk of leaving an opening for a reversal. The only downfall is that you cannot use EF in the air.

Defensive

As long as you are considered to be in a grounded state you can cancel anything into EF. That means you can cancel a lot of reversals on the first couple of frames into extend force. You can use this to keep yourself safe or confirm a hit into a combo from there.

Neutral

The speed effects of EF can also make your spacing more intimidating. Slow but large normals become much deadlier tools and can help generate more damage off random confirms.

Force Gauge Values

The speed of your Force Gauge recovery changes based on what Arcana you are using and what action you performed to deplete it in the first place. As a general rule, recovery after a EF cancel or raw EF is fast. Recovery after a burst or an Arcana Blaze is much slower by comparison.